


From New York, with love

by circa (stealthturtle)



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Domestic, Domestic Fluff, Fluff, Future Fic, Light Angst, M/M, Romance, Very light I promise
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-03
Updated: 2020-12-04
Packaged: 2021-03-09 17:39:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 4,100
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27860137
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stealthturtle/pseuds/circa
Summary: It's been eighteen months since they moved to Brooklyn and three months since they've moved out of it, and Manhattan hasn't been treating them any better.The price tag on their new apartment had a disgusting amount of zeros in it, but Stiles had loved the sun room, and said the kitchen was"bitching", and, really Derek would have gotten him the moon if he had asked him to.Or: A year in review, through the letters for the life they left behind, as told by Derek Hale
Relationships: Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski, Scott McCall/Kira Yukimura, Vernon Boyd/Erica Reyes
Comments: 2
Kudos: 38





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [princecharmingwinks](https://archiveofourown.org/users/princecharmingwinks/gifts).



> For ysa, jarett, and gerome. The three quarters to my whole idiot. Also for ell! I've been writing this baby for a long time throughout the semester, just been meaning to finish it at least within the year lol. Ah, the interference of institutionalised education. 
> 
> Hope you all enjoy the warmth I packed into this lil thang!

**February** _. “You left the towels on the bed again! That’s how you get molds, Derek!”_

The shrill sound of their bedside alarm wakes him up like it routinely does. Derek _abhors_ it. He slaps around the end table to slam it shut and sighs at the silence that comes after it toggles off.

He rolls over, shoving Stiles' limbs that clung onto him in their sleep off his back. 

"Stiles," he drawls, shaking the younger man's hip.

This was their morning routine on Tuesdays and Fridays. The alarm Stiles sets for his 8AM class does nothing for him, but as long as it wakes Derek up, he’s got someone to make sure he gets there on time, because -

" _Stiles_ ," Derek repeats.

Because Stiles is an asshole who doesn’t give a shit about anyone else’s sleep, that’s why. But that hasn't stopped Derek from doing this every damn day since school started up again.

Stiles eventually rouses, though it takes five more minutes of poking, prodding, and eventually kicking him out of bed. Derek sighs witheringly before getting up after him. He curses Stiles’ State Theory class for no reason at all (reason: the alternative is cursing Stiles for enrolling in an 8AM class like a fucking idiot) and slogs through making breakfast. He’s awake anyway, and Stiles tends to act like bitch and a half without his morning caffeine.

But when Stiles leaves in a rush for his morning commute, dress shirt buttoned haphazardly and eyes bright, he kisses Derek slow and sweet in that way he does before making his exit. And he says, “Thanks for breakfast, baby,” and _that_ \- that sort of makes everything okay.  
  


. . . 

Being a writer for a Fantasy series really should be easier since he’s a creature of fantasy himself. 

It’s not, if you were wondering.

Miranda’s made her eighth call to him since this morning, reminding Derek that chapters 21 through 25 should have been sent to her two days ago, but two days ago Stiles had a full-on  _ crisis _ about his academic standing in the department, and that just meant dropping everything to make the 20-minute trip they took to Fizz Creamery (Stiles’ favourite ice cream shop that sells Tutti Frutti as an ungodly flavour) that was a precursor to the 6-hour crisis management that followed, with Derek convincing Stiles the entire time that getting his Masters in History wasn’t a dumb idea and no, Derek’s not going to hate him for being a “waste of money”. 

_ “It’s just so  _ hard,” Stiles had sniffled into the older man's shirt on Wednesday, smearing his Tutti Frutti ice cream on the front of it.  _ “And my tuition fee is directly proportionate to how dumb I am, Der!” _

Which was wrong - the complete opposite, in fact - Derek had told him. He’s paying upwards of $60,000 for Stiles’ education. That meant Stiles was, he supposes, negative amounts of dumb using that logic...right? 

Fuck metaphors. His brain hurts. The point is, Wednesday clearly wasn’t a good day to submit his chapters. Sue him, Miranda. 

But now it’s Friday, and Derek hasn’t stepped foot out of the apartment since. Maybe he should go out and let the New York air (that smelled perpetually of dried piss and designer perfume) nourish his inspiration. He’s only 5 chapters away from closing the final installment in  _ Galman’s End, _ and yet, he’s never been more lost in what the fuck his characters are planning to do to save the world. Whatever it is, he’d like to know, thank you very much, and as soon as possible before Miranda rips his balls off.

He can’t even remember how he got here. Holding down a sci-fi writing job feels downright  _ bizarre  _ after all the fieldwork he did as Beacon Hills’ last living Hale. He went from living the life of danger to just  _ writing  _ about it. Most days he’s not sure whether to like this life or to feel disgusted that writer’s block is now his biggest threat to overcome. 

Stiles always says he should probably go with the former. But Stiles drools on his textbooks and keeps forgetting to check their mail for when the bills are due, so what does he know? 

Derek huffs a breath through his nose and runs a hand over his face. It's 3 in the afternoon and Stiles would be coming home soon. Derek could picture it clearly: he'd flurry in like a storm, rattling on about classes and his coursemates, shedding clothes as he goes further in their home. It's a routine Derek relies on, something predictable yet so varied in the stories Stiles tells. It damn well might be the best part of his day. 

He pushes off his desk and exits the study. The apartment feels cavernous when it’s not filled with Stiles’ engulfing presence - his loud chatter, the coffee cups he leaves around window sills because he keeps forgetting he’s already brewed them. Where there is Stiles, there is a mess. Though the place looks tidy, as it always is in the afternoon once Derek has it all to himself to fix up, not having the mess makes it look less inviting. It’s too big for two people, especially by New York standards. The price tag on the apartment had a disgusting amount of zeros in it, but Stiles had loved the sun room, and said the kitchen was " _ bitching _ ", and, really Derek would have gotten him the moon if he had asked him to.

So now they have a sun room. Derek still doesn’t know what it’s for. Stiles says it’s  _ “for lazy Sunday mornings” _ , but then they’ve both been sleeping in on Sunday mornings well into the afternoon, so who were they kidding. So far, the room has only been vacated for nights when they liked to see the rain fall on the glass panes. They don’t get to soak up much sun in the sun room, is the point. There’s also the three and a half bathrooms they don’t know what to do with, the two guest rooms with all that  _ space _ that doesn’t get taken up by anyone else, and the living room from IKEA-Hell that they had had trouble decorating just because it was so damn big. Derek regularly wonders why an apartment needed  _ this  _ many alcoves. 

But Stiles had adored the place, and that’s the only thing that mattered at the time. Their Brooklyn apartment had somehow been shittier than the loft, a byproduct of purchasing the first rentable place they could find on craigslist while on the plane ride to JFK. So  _ this _ , however grand it was to the point that Derek feels guilty for having used so much of his family’s money (and still barely,  _ inconceivably _ , made a dent), this was better.

Stiles had long staked claim on the kitchen, wagging a newly-bought wooden spoon in front of Derek’s face as he proclaimed his kingdom there on their third day of settling into the place. But Stiles rarely spends any time there since his classes take up a large chunk of the day, so the wooden spoon sits in its holder, collecting dust all because Stiles forbade him from touching his mother’s cookware.

Tonight is a pasta kind of night. Derek only really knows how to cook a few things and they’re all mostly carbs like potatoes, rice, and pasta. Stiles liked carbs, at least. He rummages through the cupboards for the Italian tomato sauce they buy in jars and the butterfly pasta Stiles liked best.

So, see, sometimes Derek makes novels; tries to get his chapters submitted on time and thinks of plot holes to fill and characters to maybe kill. Sometimes he spends hours suspended in bewilderment, his instincts not quite used to being so settled. Sometimes the apartment is so big and the demands of Miranda so tall, he feels like booking it all the way back to Beacon Hills again. 

But most of the time, he just makes dinner. 

Not that Derek will ever admit to it. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Hypothetically," Stiles asks, legs entangled with his, "what would you do if I got kidnapped."

**_March_ ** _. "How many lives do I have to live to deserve you?" _

"Hypothetically," Stiles asks, legs entangled with his, "what would you do if I got kidnapped." 

"What?" Derek breathes out, chest rising up and down with laboured breaths. His eyebrows meet in the middle of his forehead, wondering how in god’s name Stiles was capable of stringing together a sentence after Derek just went down on him. 

"It's a big city. It’d make sense to track me down from miles away back in the ‘Hills, yeah, but New York is a concrete jungle with all sorts of confusing scents, I bet.” 

“Did I...hallucinate giving you an orgasm?”

Stiles burrows his head into the pillow when he laughs, revealing the pale column of his throat marked with all the red Derek had left on him. “You most definitely did not, babe. Little Stiles is sated and happy and so is this Stiles.” He waggles his eyebrows. Derek can’t believe he’s in love with this idiot.

Still, he responds, “I’d find you.” 

Stiles cups the side of his face, bringing their mouths together in a wet-sounding kiss. “I know you would, but  _ how. _ ” There's a hand that’s slinking down the planes of Derek’s abs and dipping to run across the length of his dick. Derek sucks in a breath and rests his forehead against Stiles’, who is continuing his train of thought, “Would my scent be enough? Or would you be able to somehow hear me if I screamed? What is the extent of the decibel werewolves can hear in?” 

Derek had an answer, he did, but all he says is “ _ Fuck, yeah,  _ like that, _ ” _ when Stiles starts pumping his erection in the tight circle of his hand. He feels his balls pull in when Stiles’s mouth sucks something fierce into the juncture of his neck, mumbling into it, “I just want to know, y’know?”

He knows. 

Derek closes his mouth over Stiles’ and kisses him soundly. For a second it seems like Stiles wants to continue talking, but Derek bites his bottom lip and closes a hand around Stiles’ throat the way he likes to, and the words get lost in the meeting of their tongues and the rhythmic, wet slide of lube. Stiles stops talking and starts jerking the older man off in earnest, eyes fluttering open and shut every time Derek squeezes around his windpipe every couple of seconds or so. 

Things sort of fade to white from there, and Stiles forgets all about his hypothetical question. 

. . .

Stiles makes Sunday dinner and burns it, and really, no one in their two-person household is surprised. 

The tray of shriveled lasagna steams on the island counter, and Stiles is trying to reintroduce some moisture to it by adding more tomato sauce. Derek’s got one hand on his cellphone with Domino’s number already half-dialed, but Stiles throws him these pleading looks like he’s waiting for a miracle to pull through and not have to concede defeat to pizza take-out. 

“I’m a decent home-maker, goddamnit!” Stiles exclaims and throws a dish towel at the charred facsimile of pasta. “We need a new oven. This one’s broken, Derek.” 

Derek hums absent-mindedly and orders a vegetarian and a pepperoni. 

“This is not a fair trade-off,” Stiles grumbles. 

“What are you so upset about?”

“Because!” Stiles steps closer to him, tomato sauce on the edge of his frown, “You can’t be the - the bread-winner  _ and _ the home-maker, it makes me look bad!” He looks so ridiculous in his orange bathrobe Derek only hides his laugh behind his cellphone.

“Derek, I’m not trying to be funny!” Stiles protests. 

Derek just keeps chuckling to himself. Stiles throws a tomato sauce-soaked towel at him, which he doesn’t even have to pause to catch. 

“I hate your werewolf reflexes sometimes, dude!” 

Derek looks at him, eyes alight with amusement. Stiles is dressed down in a homely bathrobe and white slides so old they’re yellow, and he looks too adorable to convey the frustration he probably wants Derek to catch on. “You need to relax,” he tells the younger man, “pizza’s on its way and I’ll check the uh, the oven later if you want me to.”

“No, I don’t  _ want _ you to do anything, didn’t you hear me?” Stiles crosses his arms, “I don’t like feeling like - like,  _ ugh. _ Like I’m your charge. I’m your  _ partner _ , and I can’t even make you dinner without making it carcinogenic.” 

“Whatever they’re teaching you in NYU, they’re clearly over-selling the dangers of burnt pasta.” 

Stiles stares lamely at him. “You know what I mean, you dork. My ego is wounded and not even pizza can make me feel better tonight.”

Derek nods faux-sombrely. “This must be really serious, then.”

“If you make fun of me, I will  _ make you sleep on the couch. _ ” 

Derek sighs through a smile, and pulls Stiles in by the loose loop of his bathrobe, holds him close and nips at his ski-slope nose. “How many times are we going to have this conversation?” 

“This is literally the first time we’re having this conversation,” Stiles pulls his head away from Derek's teeth

“Nope,” he pops the ‘p’, “we had this when you enrolled in your degree program. We had this when we realised an apartment this big costs a lot to keep. We had this on my  _ birthday _ when you got mad at me for buying you that Nespresso machine I called a ‘joint gift’ because all you could get me was that Casio watch from a Daiso.” 

“ _ Dude,  _ we said we wouldn’t talk about that again!”

Derek kisses him. When he pulls away, he says, “The point is, I’m  _ incapable _ of not providing for you.” 

“That’s cheesy, and you’re missing the point. I just - I wanna feel  _ useful,  _ y’know? I leave the bills to you, I leave the  _ house _ to you, and all I can do is come back to a clean place and eat the food you make me, and then I’ve got school shit to do and you just -  _ you give me a can of coke. _ That’s what you do.”

“That’s what I do,” he parrots. 

“What do  _ I  _ do, Der?” Stiles looks at him seriously. “What are you getting out of this?”

Derek rests his forehead against Stiles’, breathes in the scent of home. “You stock up on groceries, and you never come back without the dumb probiotics you force me to drink.”

“They’re good for your colon, fuck you.”

He huffs out a laugh. “And you hang up all the towels.”

“That’s barely a contribution, you were just raised by wolves.” 

“Oh?”

“Absolutely.” 

Derek’s hand shove into the folds of Stiles’ robes and flutters over all the spots that make Stiles wheeze in laughter, making the younger man twist and nearly bend back just to get away from him. But Derek is strong, so they stay like that for a loud, mirthful while, with Stiles yelling  _ “no, fuck you, lay off!” _ and Derek letting his chest rumble playfully. 

But then the doorbell rings, and he smells the food. So before he opens the door, he announces to the air, “You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me,” and his gaze lands on a pudgy delivery boy looking at him quizzically. 

“Uh, that’ll be $20.” 

Stiles is laughing in the background as Derek pays, and when the door closes shut, he thinks he got the point across when Stiles thanks him for dinner with a greasy kiss. 


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> May. “I still don’t know what you see in me sometimes.”

During finals week, while the rest of the graduate studies population are grappling at their last straws of sanity, for some inexplicable reason Stiles thrives  _ best  _ under chaos.

Derek’s got Stiles’ third mug of iced coffee in hand as he stares - with a healthy amount of fear - at his boyfriend, who’s got a Taylor Swift album blasting in his office, mouth chasing after the straw on his last container of caffeine without really  _ seeing  _ the utensil. Stiles says around it when he finally catches the straw, “Babe, have you seen my civil war book?”

“Which one?”

“The one with the uh,” he turns the pages on all five books splayed in front of him, seemingly reading multiple passages from different references like an absolute lunatic, “the flags. The - y’know which one.” He makes a vague gesture with his hand before exclaiming, “ _ Aha!  _ Finally fucking found your crimes, Emerson! God, that took way too long, I’m behind on schedule.” 

“You have a schedule for...this?” Derek refers to the teetering pile of papers and reference material decorating the table. He doesn’t know why Stiles has two picture frames sandwiched under his thesis paper and the book Stiles was looking for, but there they are. 

“Of course I’ve got a schedule,” Stiles responds, swiveling around to accept the mug. “Should I really be on more caffeine?”

Derek shrugs. “You asked for more.” 

Stiles grins toothily at him. “I love how we’ve graduated from you questioning everything I ask for.”

“Says who?” Derek rebutts with a snort, just to be on the contrary. He knows this is what Stiles looks like when he’s completely in his element:  _ chaotic _ and with the Speak Now album playing in the background. He can’t help but be a little bit impressed each time he chances upon this. 

“Your mouth questions what this coffee answers for itself.” 

“That’s your last cup, savour it.” 

Stiles nods. “Last cup for the morning, got it.”

“For the  _ day.” _

“Exactly. The AM. Will resume on the PM.” 

Derek sighs. “I’m blowing up the Nespresso.” 

“Don’t you  _ dare _ hurt Charlie.” 

He shrugs and pushes away from the door frame. “I brought that machine into this world, I can take it out.” 


	4. Chapter 4

**_June._ ** _ “My boyfriend is a celebrity! We should charge people to look at you.”  _

Publicity events never get easier. Stiles, however, gets better at trying to oversell him each time he has a book launch. 

Galman's End is, well,  _ ending. _ He's a little melancholy, sure, because what kind of writer doesn't get attached to their characters anyways. But Derek's looking forward to moving on from this series and onto the next one; something less YA and more, he doesn't know, maybe just  _ adult. _ Not like erotica, which Stiles has overzealously suggested every time they talk about his next plot prospects. Not that there's anything wrong with erotica, it's just not something he'd like to spend years writing about. 

He's signing book copies, and for all the fight he puts up with Miranda about all the pop-up events she makes him do to bat his eyelashes and quadruple their revenue, he likes interacting with his readers: the people who have willingly become immersed in the world he’s created as much as he is. Stiles’ enthusiastic voice sits in the back of his mind, a constant chatter playing up what kind of a person he is. Stiles found out that  _ Galman’s End _ fans built their own fanbase on the basis of his and Stiles’ partnership, and Stiles  _ relishes _ in it. 

_ “Just yesterday, he saved a puppy! I know, I don’t know how he’s even real either. He’s a pod person, really.” _

He snorts at Stiles’ far-away voice as he writes a dedication to a mother’s son on the front page of his book copy. “Thank you for coming,” he smiles at her. 

“Barry says your books saved him,” she returns the smile kindly. “I don't know how else to thank you for that. If it’s alright, I wanted to leave you a letter he wrote for you. He’s sick today, and he’s pretty devastated that he couldn’t come. It’d mean the world to him if you read it,” She peels away from the line after, and Derek is hit all over again with how  _ lucky _ he is. 

_ “Derek’s registered at the Red Cross, which is super fortunate because he can administer first aid at his own signings, you know, if he had to! I hope he doesn’t...but he  _ could!” 

A young girl comes next, eyes alight with excitement that Derek still somehow can’t believe is for him signing her book. 

“Hello!” She exclaims. “I’m Yana, but I don’t want you to write my name on here. But don’t get me wrong, Mister! I love your books, really.”

“Hello, Miss Yana,” Derek responds, smiling warmly. She reminds him of Stiles. “To whom should I dedicate it to, then?”

“Could you…” she trails off, rummaging deep in her jean pocket to retrieve a crumpled ball of paper, “Write down my siblings’ names?” 

“Of course.” He unrumples the paper and sees seven names written down. Eight siblings in Yana’s family. “I used to have a big family like this, Miss Yana. It’ll be no problem at all.”

As he deciphers the messy scrawl of the names she’s written down, Yana speaks up, “Do you have a smaller family now, Mister Derek? I heard from my older sister you were married.” 

Derek chuckles. “Not married, but I might as well be.” He cranes his neck up to look for Stiles, who’s sitting with a bunch of people he probably just met, talking animatedly with them with an ease Derek always was gobsmacked by. You could leave Stiles in an apocalypse and he’d still make friends. “You see that guy?” 

Yana stands on her tip toes to see where he’s pointing. “Where?”

“The one with the cute nose.” 

Yana giggles at this, then says, “I think I see him. He’s very handsome, Mister Derek!” 

“It’s kind of just him and me,” he says, then squints at the paper, “Sorry, what does this say?”

“Barbara,” Yana supplies, “that’s my older sister! Could you put a heart next to her name? She’d absolutely  _ die.”  _

“Of course.” He does as he’s told. Seven names are written down on the front page, and as an after-thought, Derek adds as a post-script:  _ And to Yana, whose heart is as big as Dr. Felix’s plans for world domination.  _ “All done.”

“Thank you very much Mister Derek!” She retrieves her book and holds it close to her person, then says loudly as she flounces off,” I hope you get married and have a big family again, soon!”

The on-lookers laugh, charmed by her parting words. Derek catches Stiles’ eye as the next person plops down their book. Stiles looks back, impish grin on his face, and winks at Derek. 


	5. Chapter 5

**_August._ ** _ "Could you bring home groceries? We're all out of lettuce."  _

42nd street blinks at him from a McDonald’s he’s standing outside of, and Derek once again wonders why the hell this city looks like it’s constantly on some type of hallucinogen. New York invented lights that were brighter than  _ bright _ , and even back when he and Laura lived here in a shoebox condominium for years, he never got used to how otherworldly it looked here. 

He's got a burlap sack filled with Trader Joe's food items because Stiles would have a conniption if he dared use plastic for their shopping, a cupcake box suspended precariously from the ground in his right hand. He's struck with the ridiculous feeling of looking too hipster to feel this  _ old.  _

He's tired, is the thing. Maybe it's the hustle and bustle of this place. You learn a lot of things weaving in and out of the city that just won't goddamn sleep, and Derek, a Californian born and bred in the toy of a town called Beacon Hills, finds himself staring sleepily at Times Square every night.

For all he thought it would transform him, New York sure does make him feel like a perpetual tourist. 

Sometimes it's the most freeing thing to live in supernaturally-neutral ground where eleven million people couldn't give more of a shit if he was a packless Alpha. No one cares; the commercial models rushing to make it to their next casting don't give him a second glance, nor do the teenagers recklessly attempting to skate through the narrow walkways. The city pulses with life so different from the Nemeton, and Derek loves the way he can blend into it as if he weren't one sibling shy away from being the last Hale werewolf. 

" _ Shit, _ sorry, kid!" Heat soaks the front of his cotton shirt. When he looks down there's an entire take-out bowl's worth of clam chowder splashed on it. 

Derek scowls at the woman looking at him with equal disdain, before grumbling about dinner and turning on her heel to walk away. Chunks of scallops run in globs over the top of the cupcake box.

Most times the city is an escape, but times like this it's a sloppy bitch. 

**Author's Note:**

> Leave some love in the comments for a starving author!


End file.
